Black Rose

(A fantasy saga with knights and wizards (sort of) and dragons, so... it's gotta have unicorns, right?

I mean, doesn't everyone like unicorns?

Heh.

There'll be a bit of an interval after this one. Until now, all the previous chapters were more or less extensive redrafts of existing chapters, but for the next one, which connects the Chariot storyline (most of which is from about 20 years earlier) to the present, I had very little, and so am busy writing as I go. It'll be a few days, I think.

In the meantime, our gang of misfits who don't much like each other get thrown together again, by circumstances.)

***

Chapter 18

The Unicorn

'Right,' said Owyn. 'I'm off.'

Solveig looked up from where she was helping Paul get the fire going. The tinder had caught, and the firewood was starting to smoke.

Owyn had his crossbow in one hand and his quiver over his shoulder.

'I'm coming with you,' she said, and stood up.

'Oh,' he said after a pause. 'All right.'

'Why?' she said, 'do you not want me to come with you?'

'It's not that,' he said. 'I mean, just, you've never come before.'

'I need to see how you shoot,' she said. 'I have only shot the straw target.'

'Come on, then,' he said, and she wiped her hands, and they entered the woods.

He was annoyed that she was coming with him.

After weeks on the road, they were all right enough with each other that Owyn was able to go off and hunt for the pot, so that Paul didn't have to keep spending money on food.

But he'd liked the pot-hunting. It had become a time of ease, away from the tense silences and resentments which happened around the others.

And, for a little bit, it'd also been a chance to relieve a little of the strain of travelling with a beautiful girl who he'd, well, done wrong, and who therefore was now and forever out of reach.

He'd never thought of himself as having much time for shame, but even he drew the line at jerking off in front of a client, and he'd valued the time in the forest chiefly for those few minutes when he could be safely out of her sight and earshot, summon up a few memories, and pull a quick one.

Funny thing, though.

Since he'd been travelling with her, and exposed to the full force of the lass's day-in day-out contempt, there'd never been any possibility of fantasising about her.

If it had been some bird he'd never seen again, and he'd closed the deed without any force, it might at one time have been the inspiration for many a quiet, pleasurable moment.

But now, the whole sorry fuckmarsh was too gone-over in public, too wiped all over with shame and regret, for him to be able to take any pleasure in thinking about her.

And, even more annoying, it wasn't just her.

There'd been other times, not many but some, when he'd been, shall we say, not exactly punctilious about how he'd gained access to a lady's charms. And they were all now tainted with the dislike Solveig felt for him, which she was so fond of reminding him about. It was like seeing himself in a mirror that showed all his flaws and none of his better qualities.

In order to summon up pleasant memories, he now had to dig far back in his past.

To a time when he'd been a one-woman man, when he'd go off and fight, and keep himself virtuous, and then come back home to his...

No, better not think abouther. The memory of her long, smooth body and her red hair and her mischievous smile was just about the only memory of being with a woman that he could now think about, without guilt creeping in and spoiling everything.

Well, unless you counted that barmaid in Galleoso that time.

And that shepherd girl.

And that posh bird at the party who threw herself at me because I looked good in a uniform.

Apart from them, though, if you thought about it, it was a sorry tale. A tale of favours grudgingly given, and deals done, and many a maiden's apathy or greed getting the better of her pride.

All of it coming to a head one night, at an inn, when Ialmostlet myself be talked into taking it by force.

And that was the sticking point. That was...

Don't pussyfoot it. The bookman's right. Don't blame the fat bastard. You were thinking about it before he suggested it. You wanted to, and you didn't do it, but you didn't stop it, either. And now you have to make up for it.

And now you keep thinking about her, like a bloody idiot. You don't want to get soft about her. She's a hole in the ground full of sharpened stakes.

But still.

You can't help how you feel.

She was walking beside and a little behind him. He had been carefully avoiding looking at her.

She pushed aside a branch that was in her way, and it snapped.

'Best keep the noise down,' he said, 'or we'll scare off the wildlife.'

She ignored him.

'Not that I wish to stem the delightful flow of your talk,' he grunted.

'I've said everything I have to say,' she said. 'See no reason to repeat it.'

'This is a pleasant change from you telling me what a cunt I am.'

'I'm tired of telling you what a cunt you are,' she said. 'Prefer to assume you've now learned that lesson.'

'I like to think I have,' he said.

'We'll see,' she said. 'Look. A squirrel.'

She halted and pointed up ahead. He lifted the bow, but he couldn't see it.

'Where,' he said.

'The bough of that ash,' she said. 'There.'

He blinked, but the bough of the tree seemed to merge with the trees beyond it, and the view generally.

'Your eyesight's better than mine,' he said.

'Can you not see it?' she said.

'No,' he said, annoyed.

There was a pause. She stared ahead at the squirrel he couldn't see, and cursed under her breath.

On an impulse, he held out the crossbow to her.

'You do it,' he said.

She stared at him.

'Shoot it,' he said. 'Show me what you can do when it's not a straw target.'

She kept staring at him, and reached out and took the crossbow from him.

He stood and looked back at her.

She stood there, the crossbow in her hands pointing at neither of them, and then she tore her gaze from him and looked at the squirrel that she could see and he couldn't, and she raised it to her shoulder, aimed and fired.

The crossbow made a clunk as it fired, and she scowled.

'Too noisy,' she said. 'It heard.'

'Got to be quicker,' he said, and held out his hand.

She handed the crossbow back to him. He pointed it at the ground, put his foot in the bow and pulled the string back till it caught the nut. Then he took a bolt from his case and placed it in the runner.

He looked up at her. She was looking at him.

'What?' he said.

'Why don't you just kill me now,' she said, 'and get it over with.'

He stared at her. He was truly unnerved.

'Swordsman,' she said in a level voice, 'why continue this charade? Why not just kill us and take the bookman's money?'

He could think of nothing to say.

'It's by far the most sensible course of action,' she said. 'We three must be wanted for murder. If you kill us and take the money, you will be just another lone swordsman on the road.'

Her voice was low, level and calm. As if she were trying to be the sensible one.

As if it didn't matter to her what she was saying to him.

'Why pretend to go on guarding us,' she said, 'when you could just kill us? Who'll know? Kill me now, go back to the camp, kill the bookman, take his money. Why do you go on pretending that you want to be some sort of guardian to us? Why continue this charade of being a, a, a good man who's made mistakes? You think you can fool me? You think I don't know what kind of man you are?'

She stared at him, genuinely baffled at his behaviour.

'I think you know what kind of man I am,' he said slowly. 'I don't think you know what kind of man I was.'

'Oh, please don't tell me that you were once a good man, but life has trodden you down.'

'I was. It has.'

'Has it. Well. I was once capable of delight. Since I went to that inn? No longer.'

'And that's my fault, is it?'

'Yes.'

'No,' he shouted, 'it's yours! It's your fault! You rode out and thought you could fight off people like me. You had no fucking idea! You should have known what would happen!'

And all of a sudden, she exploded like a firework.

'Listen to yourself!' she screamed. 'You talk like that was someone else! As if some beast had let that happen! But it wasyou! You could have stopped them!' She stabbed her finger at him.

'Yes, I could have,' he said, feeling his temper get the better of him.

'Then why did you not?'

'Cause I wanted you!' he yelled.

He hung there, and stared at her, his face twisted with anger, and then he turned his back on her and walked over to a tree and grabbed a branch and wrenched it off.

It was easier to talk without looking at her.

'Look,' he said, trying to control his tone, 'you're young, and you're beautiful, and I hadn't had anyone in a long time, and I added it all up, and I reckoned I could have you and get away with it. That's all it was. You are a beautiful woman, and I didn't reckon you'd go for me in the normal run of things, and when they started talking about taking you, it seemed like it would be easy. It's just that... once we started on doing it... I just couldn't do it. I couldn't.'

'You couldn't. Or you chose not to.'

'I dunno. It was... the thought of it.'

He looked at her, and she was looking sideways at him.

'It didn't do anything for me, anymore.'

'So you decided not to rape me because it just didn'texciteyou?'

He took a deep breath, and accepted to himself what little use were the words that he wanted least of all to say.

And yet. Better to say 'em.

'More or less. I'm sorry. I wish it were some reason that made me look good, but... yeah.'

She stared at him, and he could make no sense whatever of the look on her face.

'So, yeah,' he said, 'I went downstairs and I let them go up. It was just plain, bloody, stupid, selfish... adickthing to do. That's all it was.'

She was silent.

'I was right, wasn't I?' he said. 'You would never have gone for me.'

'No.'

'Because I'm common and dirty, and you're young and can have the pick of anyone you want. I'm not stupid.'

'No. Because even if what had happened had not happened, even if you'd been young and gentle and handsome, neither you, nor anyone else, could have had my heart. It was given to another. And he didn't want it, so now it's lost.'

'Who?' he said.

She closed her eyes for a moment. Then she opened them and said 'We need to get some food,' and looked at him expectantly.

Now is not the time, he thought.

'That we do,' he said. 'Come on.'

He looked around and listened.

'Fowl,' he said. 'This way. Keep it down.'

They made their way carefully through the trees until he held up a warning hand, and they slowed.

He squinted into the trees and could see them, two plump birds, pecking their way over the forest floor.

'See 'em?' he whispered.

'Yes.'

'You want to take the shot?'

'If I miss,' she said, 'we don't eat anything.'

'Then don't miss,' he said, and handed her the crossbow.

She lifted it to her shoulder, squinted down it, took a deep breath, breathed out, and fired.

The clunk of the bow made one of the birds lift its head in curiosity, and then the bolt sank into it and it went over. The other one flapped in a panic and hopped off into the undergrowth.

'Nice,' he said. They went forward and he leaned over, picked the bird off the ground and pulled the bolt out of it. He put it in his bag.

'Well done,' he said.

'Answer my question,' she said, looking at him suddenly.

'What question?'

'Why do you not just kill us?'

'I told you,' he said.

'No, you didn't.'

'No, I didn't,' he admitted.

'Then why?'

'Because of my reputation. You don't kill a client.'

'But nobody knows we're your clients. You could kill us and get away with it.'

'Maybe I don't want to,' he said, and handed her the bloody bolt.

She took it from him and stood, holding the crossbow in one hand, the bolt in the other.

'What's to stop you shooting me, taking your money back and going on your way?' he said.

'We need your protection,' she said.

'I wouldn't say that. You've improved mightily. Reckon you could see off a more than average villain, at this point. So why doesn't everyone just kill everyone else? Me you, you me, what's the difference?'

She paused, and had a look of such blank hopelessness that it chilled him.

'I don't know, swordsman. I have no heart, I told you. I gave away my love. I lost my dignity at the inn. I've nothing, now. There are times I'd welcome death.'

He stared at her, helpless.

'You want to know why I don't just kill you?' he said. 'Because I'm not a monster.'

'Explain to me how you are not.'

'You're young,' he said, 'but haven't you ever done anything you knew was wrong, but you couldn't stop yourself? D'you know how it happens? You start doing one thing that's a bit wrong, and it's not that bad, and you get away with it, and then you go a bit farther, and then a bit farther, and before you know it you're so deep in a world of shit that you can't breathe. Can you imagine what that's like?'

*

Solveig looked at him, thinking of herself and Siegfa, sharing a bed, sharing their lives, sharing everything.

And in the end, finding out that she had shared nothing.

That he had been a stranger to her all along.

The look on his face, as he left her in the bed, as she begged him to stay with her, to not go out into the night. That look of shocked loathing.

When all she had wanted was to have him close.

'Yes,' she said.

'Then you should know what it's like to hate yourself,' he said. 'The only chance I got to not spend the rest of my shitty life drinking myself to death, is if I do something that isn't just for me. And whether you like it or not, and I know you don't, this is it.'

*

She looked positively exasperated. Nothing he could do about that.

'I don't expect you to stop hating me,' he said. 'But that's why. I'm not gonna die old and happy with lots of grandchildren round me bed. I know that, by now. So I'd at least like to die feeling like I wasn't a shit-smear on the boot of the world.'

He paused, and heard how this sounded.

'So,' he added, 'hang on. Maybe it is for me.... Yeah, part of it is. But it's also for you and him.'

They stared at each other for a long moment. Then he took his money bag off his belt.

'All right,' he said. 'All right. You have nothing, I get that. And it's my fault.'

He collected himself, then held out the money bag.

'Here's your money,' he said. 'His money. Whatever. I don't want it.'

'What?' she said, baffled.

'I don't want your money,' he said. 'Our contract is over. I'll protect you for nothing. Just to fuckin' show you. I won't accept any money from you or the bookman, and I won't leave your side until you order me to. And I'll defend you and the bookman with my life, if I have to. Will that satisfy you?'

She stared at him for a moment, then in one movement she cocked the crossbow, loaded the bolt into it, and pointed it at his chest. As she raised it, he was pulling his sword out of his scabbard so that by the time the crossbow was pointed at his heart, he had his sword raised and the tip of it was at her throat.

'You mock me?' she said, furious.

'No,' he said.

'You give us back the money,' she said fiercely, 'and all hold we have over you is gone. You think I'm stupid as well as weak?'

'I thought you welcomed death,' he said.

'I don't care what happens to me, but the bookman went to help me, and he was abused. I owe him protection.'

'I'll protect you. That's what I'm sayin'. I'll protect you both. I'll do it for nothing.'

'Why? Why would you do that?'

'You think there's nothing to live for?'

'I don't speak for anyone else, but I have little to live for.'

'You're too young to know that for sure.'

'I have lived a life already, swordsman,' she said. 'I have had enough heartbreak, believe me.'

'You think you're the only one who's ever had a broken heart?' he said. 'I was in love, once.'

'Don't tell me,' she said. 'You let someone rape her, and for some reason, she left you.'

That got him, and he had turn around and take a deep breath, and fight the impulse to hit her, she was that lippy.

But.

Yeah. All right.

'No,' he said. 'I loved Elaine. And she loved me. We were gonna be married. But I knew I didn't have enough money. She wanted me to stop soldiering an' open an inn, but inns cost money.'

He paused. He lowered the sword. It was ridiculous. He wasn't going to kill her.

'And there was always another job. I was always off fightin'. Besides, I liked it. An' it just... wore us down, the bickering. I was stupid. I liked earning the money more than I liked doing nothing with her. When she realised it, she left me. I come home one evening. Fire dead. House empty. Girl gone. She married some other bloke.'

He paused again, and stared at the ground, remembering.

Then he looked up at her.

'But she was bloody lovely. She was smart and wise and beautiful. And I lost her to that prick. Well, he wasn't the worst, but at the time, I fuckin' hated him.'

'Where are they now,' said Solveig, still pointing the crossbow at his heart.

'Oh,' he said, 'the war. All gone. Whole town.'

'What town?'

'Sharlackberg,' he said.

She nodded. There was a silence.

'What about you?' he said. 'That bloke you loved. What'd he do? Leave you for someone else? If we find him, I can be very persuasive.'

'No,' she said. 'He killed himself.'

'Oh,' he said, and then thought for a moment and looked at her with wonder and pity.

'Oh, hell,' he said. 'Your brother.'

'Yes,' she said.

'But that could never, ever have worked out.'

'It was doomed,' she said, in a flat voice, still pointing the crossbow at his heart, but her gaze was past him.

'All along,' she said, 'I kept it from him, our whole life together, until not long before he died. Then, when I... let him see that I loved him, he thrust me away, the way you would a dog with plague. He looked at me with such hate. He made it clear that I was nothing to him but a servant. And three nights later he was violated and beaten, and when I found him, he refused me and put a sword to his own throat.'

He tried to find the words. But there were none.

But you have to speak.

'Fucking hell, Solveig of Hargest,' he said at last. 'To be honest, I'm surprised you haven't killed yourself already.'

'Mine has been an ill-starred life, swordsman,' she said slowly, 'and of all those stars, you're just the most recent. And not the biggest. Now you know it all. Feel free to laugh.'

They faced each other for a long moment.

'You see me laughing,' he said.

There was a long silence. She kept the crossbow pointed at him, breathing steadily.

'I've done bad things,' he said. 'Think I don't know that? Terrible things. Maybe the worst I ever did, was let them go up those stairs. Don't reckon I can make up for it. Fuck knows you don't want to let me. But if shooting me with that thing would do it, if taking your revenge would make you feel better, then pull the fucking trigger, Solveig.'

She stared at him, her red-rimmed eyes glittering, the crossbow pointing at his heart.

''Cos I'd sooner you took your revenge on me,' he said, 'than go on like this, with you not letting me do what I have to do.'

She kept aiming it at his heart for a long moment.

Then she took out the bolt, lowered the crossbow, released the string, and carefully unbent the bow.

He nodded. He wasn't going to get off that easily.

'No,' he said. 'Fair enough.'

Then he looked up at her, and saw her bleak gaze refocusing on something behind him, her eyes widening and then narrowing, her mouth opening slightly.